Champ

Champ

         We talk about it like it was yesterday…

         The blood hadn’t yet begun to dry on the sidewalk, but we knew there would be more.  It was necessary.  The concrete craved it the way a cactus craves water on the only rainy day of the year.  There would be more.  We just knew it.  As we looked from one to the other, we wondered aloud who would be next.

         We had all been warned not to go down there, but as was his way, Champ didn’t listen.  He was one of those guys that needed to smooth his own way along the jagged blades of life.  If he had to get cut, he preferred to grab the blade rather than wait for someone to bring it to him.  Well, he needn’t worry about that anymore.  It had come and it would come no more; nor would he.  He wasn’t expected to live.

Of darkness color me
My life now done with chance
Amongst the night I linger still
For I know how to dance

No sadness as my body goes
For I have lived a life
Real or not real not a care
I stood and now I lie

A nightmare now within my reach
No need to ask for air
For surely death is obvious
If not, don’t give a care

And though there is no more to teach
A fool gives all and weeps
The ground is cold and oh so deep
Dark comfort as I sleep

         I’m not sure any of us really knew Champ.  Sure we knew where he lived and what his Pops did for a living.  We knew his mom served food in the cafeteria in the morning and returned at noon to serve lunch.  We knew his sister was dating this guy nobody liked and that she’d likely try to run off before she started to show.  We knew his brother was grasping straws in a drug rehab.  We knew all this, but we didn’t know Champ. 

         We didn’t know Champ went to school early each morning to do special tutoring or that he was so much better at jazz than at that music he played in the school band.  We didn’t know that.  None of us knew that with each passing day and each new gift discovered that Champ was that much closer to his grave.  How could we?  We were just kids with faint hopes of going out in a blaze of glory rather than admit that living we were useless and in death, worth less than that.  We expected to die at any moment.

A righteous man
Standing ready in his madness
Celebrated for nothing
Celebrated for badness

He wakes a sleeping innocent
He wipes away their smile
He holds out for a dollar
He walks an endless mile

No water for the thirsty man
Mere whisky for the blind
Doing penance for doing nothing
Doing nothing but doing time

         We were actually a little surprised when Champ wandered into our turf.  He was so far off our path that our first instinct was to beat him up, so we did.  He didn’t swing back.  He didn’t even cry, but as soon as he got the chance, he took down the biggest and the meanest amongst us without even breaking a sweat.  It was beautiful.  But when we were ready to lay down our oaths to our new messenger, even as young as he was, he simply points over to me and says, “You run with this.” I was the youngest in my family and the youngest in this club up until then, I hadn’t run a thing.

         Even as you could feel guys taking in a breath to object, the air just as quietly left their bodies as his gaze shifted from one to the next.  He’d take off his glasses and give you a special look that cooled your blood.  The guys knew they’d probably have to fight for their objections and just didn’t feel it was worth it at the time.  So, I was now the leader of a gang with no purpose other than taking up the time between one minute and the next; one gangster stroll no different from the one before.

         Now as I sat around pondering the immediate future of our gang, the guys were jerking my chain for our revenge song.  I hadn’t even made up the words, but I knew the tune.  We’d snatch some poor sucker heading out for a pizza or a keg of beer.  We’d probably knife him and decide later if we wanted him to live to tell or die to tell.  Up until then, we’d done none of it.  As the words gathered in my mind, I wanted to sing a song of repentance, but I kept hitting sour notes.  Champ was wrong to have gone where they say he was found.  It was suicidal. 
         
         “Suicidal,” there was that word I kept tripping over.  Champ had tried to commit suicide.  I knew it.  It rang truer than anything I’d ever heard.  I knew it just as I knew one of these thugs would be trying to kill me really soon.  I was no leader.  I was a stand-in and now the real leader was dying.  Champ had told me I had another story in me and I just had to find out what it was.  I thought he was nuts; smart, but nuts.  What was he talking about? 

         I grabbed up jacket and hoodie to leave.  I was going home and I’d have to chart another course to get there.  It wasn’t safe for me or anyone who looked like me.  It was less safe to cover up, so a fool was sandwiched between dying with your head up amongst strangers or dying with your head down amongst friends; a sick life.

There are no friends
Only enemies you haven’t met
Some will take your memories
The others will forget
Pull a line or smoke a toke
In either case you lose
A mistake today awoke in you
But that’s not really news
Dreams could cost you more or less
Tomorrow or today
Someone’s face on newspaper
Nothing left to say

         I hugged the corners and miraculously made it to Champ’s house.  I had no idea why I was there.  I didn’t really know these people, but somehow I felt I needed to introduce myself.  As I stood there, contemplating what to say, the door opened.  It was Champ’s Mom.  She smiled at me, hugged me, and beckoned me inside as though I was a member of the family.  I started to cry and she hugged me again.  She let me cry for a while and then she handed me an enveloped letter.  It had my name on it.  I was stunned with disbelief.  It was from Champ.

Dear Johnson,
         I’m dead, dude.  It’s alright.  I lived longer than I should have.  I stayed as long as I could stand it, but I needed to see the other side.  We played a beautiful tune together, but now you have to play alone.  Take a few words from me and work it.  You know how.

Love you man,
Champ

         None of this made any sense to me.  Champ wasn’t dead…close, but not dead.  Knowing this, I wondered why his mom handed me the letter.  It was meant to be read upon his demise, and as far as I knew, he wasn’t dying anytime soon.

         As I’m sitting there thinking about this letter, his mom’s cell phone rings.  She picks it up and motions for me to wait while she takes the call.  She barely says anything and her face is a complete blank, then she hangs up.  She asks if I can drive with her to the hospital.  I’m fully prepared to say no, but then I figure it’s safer than walking so I agree.  She hands me the keys and like any other kid, I’m not passing up the opportunity to drive, so off we go.

         On the way there, she says they told her that Champ may need more surgery, but before they can think about starting, they want to collect more blood.  Apparently, Champ has a rare blood type and since she’s O-negative, she can donate blood for him.  I can’t imagine none of the others match, but she says they don’t.  After that exchange, it’s a long quiet drive to the hospital.

         Once I park the car, I’ve nothing else to do, so I go in with her.  I’d never been in the hospital; it kind of scared me.  I must have been white as a ghost because she took my hand and held it, like I was a five-year-old going in for shots.  I didn’t even try to shake loose; I knew when I was whipped.

         At the blood bank, she told them who she was and for whom she wanted to donate blood.  They looked at her, looked at their records, and told her they couldn’t accept any more blood from her.  It was against the rules and would put her in physical danger.  She tried to insist, but you know hospitals; protocol is protocol.  I thought she was going to faint when it finally sunk in.  I grabbed a chair for her to sit down.  I didn’t know what else to do.

         I wanted to throw something.  Instead, I asked them to check me.  Could I donate?  They just grabbed me and grabbed my arm, but they only drew one tube.  I was about to object when they said they needed to check my blood type and run some other tests first.  Champ’s mom looked at me with this queer look on her face.  I assumed she was shocked that I offered and so I tried to blow it off like it was nothing.  In reality, I was surprised at myself.  It was the bravest thing I had ever done.  I’d never done anything so important and with so much risk.  Suppose I didn’t match?

         It seemed like hours went by and all the time, his mom stared at me.  It was as though she wanted to say something.  As it was, she opened her mouth to speak several times, but then said nothing.  I figured she was trying to figure out a way to thank me or ask me something about Champ that she knew I would never tell her.  When they finally called my name to return to the window, they were wide-eyed and smiling.  I was a complete match.  I could donate.  They just needed my mom to consent and were waving over Champ’s mom.  I then realized they thought Champ’s mom was my mom.  I told them that I was a friend of Champ and they would have to call my Mom on the phone.  My dad didn’t live with us.

         As I was giving them the phone number, Champ’s mom touched me on the shoulder and told me to wait.  She had something to tell me first.  When she finished, I slowly went back up to the window and told them to call my Dad.  I spoke to my Dad and consented over the phone.  I then donated a unit of blood to my kid brother.